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Meetings are held on the first and third Tuesdays of the month at Dancox House Club Room, St Clements Gardens, St Johns, Worcester from 7.30 pm to 9.30pm.
If you want to know more about Worcester Writers' Circle, please telephone Sue Round, Secretary 01905 619062.
Probably the oldest writers' circle in the country, we have grown from half a dozen enthusiasts in the dark days of the Second World War, to a thriving and productive group of people who share their experiences, successes and pitfalls at each meeting. We have a wide range of writers, some published professionals, some occasionally appearing in magazines, and many newcomers eager to see their name in print.
At a normal meeting, we read from our work, sometimes on a theme set for the evening and we offer advice and reactions. A cup of tea and a chat of course, and discussions about markets, successes and rejections. Sometimes we have a speaker from amongst our ranks, or a guestjoining us for the evening. Our interests are wide - stories, Westerns, nostalgia, poetry, biography, roofing and cats have all featured at our meetings. If you can get to Worcester, (that's the one in Worcestershire, England) give us a try.
The Way We Were
by Susan Davidson
"Where are you going?"
"Um, up the park"
"Which one?"
"Manor"
"Alright, but be back by five"
"OK Mum!"
This is a conversation I will probably never have with my daughter. But it is a conversation I had with my mother many times. I can't remember exactly how old I was when I was allowed to do this. I may have been 7 or 8, or even younger if my older sister was with me.
We lived in what is usually described as a leafy London suburb, but was in fact a sprawling council estate in Harrow. The Manor park was the nearest one. It was apparently so called because it was once the estate of Blackwell Manor, and there were many spooky stories about old mansions and fires and ghostly children - but I never saw any evidence of that. It was a bog-standard municipal recreation ground with a witch's hat, an American swing, monkey bars, a roundabout, a slide and some ordinary swings. It was bordered on two sides by a small wood, in which we made many dens and played war, cowboys & Indians, Tarzan (a game invented by a slightly scary girl called Hilda), and various other games and dares.
There was a park-keeper of course (a dying breed now, replaced by a sign giving the local council department number to call for complaints). We never knew the park-keepers name at either of the two parks we frequented. Both were referred to simply as "Parky". The Parky at the Manor Park was seldom seen, but could be summoned if there was an injured child. I once was that child. We were playing "pick up sticks", on the roundabout. A small stick was thrown out a short distance from the roundabout, then each play would hold on with one hand and reach out with the other to try to pick up the stick as the roundabout spun round. The stick would get thrown a little further from the roundabout each time. I was leaning out quite far, and my prize was in sight. I was concentrating so hard on reaching the stick that I did not see the boy on the bike heading my way. I was not aware of his presence until, just as I was about to grab the stick, the handlebar of his bike scraped the side of my head quite painfully, hard enough to draw a fair bit of blood. My friends bravely took me to Parky's hut, which we would not normally approach at all as he was legendarily grumpy. I don't remember much about it except for a vague smell of antiseptic and condensed milk, which reminded me of my Granddad. Parky took a good look at my injury and gave his expert medical opinion, which was that my hair would probably have to be cut off. I was terrified. He applied some TCP on a bit of cotton wool produced from an old tin box, and said I should go home. I was reluctant to tell my Mum what had happened, because of the hair loss danger, but luckily she disagreed with Parky.
On another occasion my sister Ellen and her friend Elaine O'Sullivan tied me to the monkey bars and left me there (presumable I was being an annoying little tike at the time). In my struggle to break free I bashed my shin hard enough to raise a lump the size of an egg. My sister and her accomplice can't have gone far, as they relented and returned to untie me, and carried me all the way home like a wounded soldier. Naturally my sister got a hell of an ear bashing from Mum, but the drama was soon over and the lump was gone within a couple of days.
There were a couple of other things. The local hard lass, Christine Stiles, once threatened me with a beating, but I somehow managed to talk my way out of any serious harm (she's quite nice now apparently, and asks after me when she sees my Mum). I have a rather more alarming memory of having my hands tied together and being marched through the woods by two boys - but that seemed to be the limit of the game (unless I've got some incredibly well suppressed memories). It was a bit scary at the time but I haven't thought about it much since.
Nobody got sued, nobody complained to the council, nobody had family therapy, and nobody panicked. And do you know what - I seem to have survived. As far as I know, children did not disappear then in any greater numbers than they do know. I remember various stories going around about creepy men who would offer you sweets and then bundle you into a car, and we all knew that we were not supposed to talk to strangers. What we did not know then is that we were far more likely to be molested by a member of our own family, and I probably wouldn't have believed it anyway. The same is still true today I understand from my colleagues in social services and the police.
So why would I not let my daughter have the same freedoms that I had as a child? Freedom to play made-up and sometimes violent or dangerous games, freedom to climb trees and run around in woods and parks with no boring old responsible adult in sight. Freedom from me.
Maybe that's at the heart of it. I feel responsible for her in every aspect - her safety, her health, her academic ability, her diet, her happiness. I often trot out the old road safety excuse - and to be fair it does have some validity. There are far more cars on the road now, 30 odd years on, and they are travelling faster. She would have to cross a fairly main road to get to a park from our house. There is a bit of green nearby that she could play on, under strict instructions to remain within that boundary.
But would anyone knock on our door and ask her out to play? School holidays are usually spent in the well-controlled environment of an organized play-scheme, which has probably been inspected to death by OFSTED. I work part time in order to do the school drop-off & pick-up (by car, I'm ashamed to say). We only know two or three of our neighbours and none of them have kids. I can't help feeling she will be missing out. She's only just about to turn five now, but in a couple of years she will be the age I was when I was allowed to go out unsupervised, as long as Mum knew where we were. I love my daughter. I love her so much it very often brings tears to my eyes. I don't want anything bad to happen to her. I don't want her to be scared, hurt, or upset. But she will experience all these things, indeed she must, if she is ever to become an adult who can cope with this world.
For now I will luxuriate in the fact that she's too young, and I can put off thinking about it for a couple of years, and hope that I will resist the temptation to wrap her up in cotton wool all the time.
Copyright © 2004 Susan Davidson